Just Another Day (in the life of a Winchester)
by GrammarDemon
Summary: Suddenly, there are rabbits. Lots of them. And they appear to worship Dean. It's weird. It's a job. And it's just another day, if you're a Winchester. One shot. Season Twelve.


In the end, Dean was glad Sam looked down before stepping out of the motel room with his giant Samsquatch feet that morning, because there could have been a tragedy.

But he did, and what he saw confused the crap out of him.

"Uh…Dean?" He turned back to look at his brother.

Dean, still stuffing guns and hotel soaps into his duffel bag—their motel had amenities, for once—heard the confusion in his brother's voice and came to his aid.

He hoped it wasn't a baby. They'd been in the same area a few months earlier. Not that he remembered it. Which is why a baby could be a possibility.

Then again, babies didn't just emerge so soon.

Unless they were Amazon babies. But then again (again), it only took about twenty-four hours for them to become full grown; Sam wouldn't be staring at his feet, if it were an Amazon infant.

Dean hurried to the door and peered down to look at whatever it was that had freaked out his giant little brother. "Um…It's a bunny."

And it was. A fluffy, gray bunny. Not your usual wild rabbit, but something that looked like it came from a pet store, with loppy ears.

Sam gave him one of his bitch faces. "I see that."

"Well, you don't need me to deal with it. Just—I don't know—step over it or something. Geez. Do I have to tell you how to deal with everything? I thought you were shrieking about something _important_." Dean went back to check the bathroom for little shampoo bottles and lotions. He liked to keep them in Baby's trunk, in a little box labeled _For Emergencies_. There had been many times his foresight had saved them from having to ride rank, side by side, in Baby's front seat for hours. Because that got to wear on a guy after a while.

He could hear Sam talking to the bunny.

"Uh…no. Where do you think you're—I said 'no'. Look, don't make me—ow! You little—get back here you sonova-"

There was a skittering sound, like claws on linoleum. Then Dean felt something somewhat heavy, and warm, on his foot. He looked down to see the bunny, sitting on the top of his boot and glaring—in kind of a cute, fluffy way—at Sam. It flicked one ear at his brother; if rabbits could give someone the finger, this one had just given it to Sam.

Then it sat up on its fat, fluffy bunny bum and stared up at him with big, round eyes. Dean's heart melted. "Aww. Hey, buddy." He bent down and scooped it up into his arms, where it seemed to sigh and settle into a rabbit-shaped loaf. A feeling of contentment, of familiarity, and overall rightness-with-the-world settled over him. Dean stroked the rabbit with his index finger and shrugged. "I think she likes me."

Sam's forehead wrinkled. "Dean-" he began bitching in that whiny, _you can't keep him_ voice—"Put it down. It could be diseased!"

"She's not diseased, Sam. Look at her! She's perfectly content. She's just a big, fat rabbit. Ow!" A sharp pinch to his index finger made him pull his hand away; only his hunter-honed reflexes had kept him from flinging the rabbit across the room when she chomped on him. Not enough to draw blood, but enough to sting. Dean shook out the pain and put his finger into his mouth even as Sam protested, "No! Don't—"

"Stop freaking out, you big baby. I'm fine. She's fine. She just didn't like that I called her 'fat'." How he knew that, he had no idea. But then again, _no_ woman liked it if you called her fat, even the ones shaped like rabbits. "You load up the car, and I'll find her a nice grassy spot near some trees to hang out in. Come on, little bunny-buddy." Dean couldn't help but croon. He really liked the rabbit, though he'd never really been one to like animals all that much before. But there was something about this bunny…

Whatever. He pushed past Sam and headed outside.

* * *

Sam finally found Dean on the patch of grass the motel considered a lawn. Bordered by an untidy jungle of scrubby bushes, poison ivy and trees, it was the perfect hideout for a rabbit. Or rabbits, as it turned out, because Dean was not alone.

He lay on his back—in full daylight!—covered by a multi-colored blanket of bunnies. Mostly young ones. Lots of them. Lots and lots and lots. It was like there had been an explosion in a rabbit factory. And all of the little fluffy critters were paying bunny-homage to his big brother.

He even had one tiny bunny—a baby, of course—perched on his forehead.

"Dean!" Sam felt a scold coming on. Dean needed a tetanus booster, for one thing. And they didn't have time to do a rabies series. They needed to get back to the bunker and keep looking for Lucifer's baby. "Dean! Get up!"

"No." Dean's voice floated up from the bunny mound. "I'm having fun."

"You look weird." Not that _that_ was anything unusual. Weird came with their line of work. "Someone's going to see you."

"Let 'em look. Come on, Sam. This is awesome. Get down here and give it a try."

 _No way._ "I am _not_ going to lie on the ground with a bunch of rodents. Rabbits are rodents, Dean. They're afraid of people. This is—this isn't right." Sam frowned. Wait. Not only wasn't this right, it was _a job_. He spun on his heel and went back to the car to get his computer, setting it up on Baby's hood so he could watch Dean, still hookup to the motel's wifi, and research the lore about bunnies.

* * *

In the end, Sam hadn't bothered to turn in the room key. They were staying another night. For one thing, when he'd finally gotten Dean to stand up, the original gray bunny and all the little bunnies followed him everywhere; if they'd tried to drive away, they would have left baby rabbit roadkill behind. For another, there was enough lore to convince Sam that something was very wrong.

"According to Aztec mythology, Ometechitli was the god of drunkenness. His name meant 'two rabbits'."

"Drunken rabbit god. Got it." Dean lifted his head enough to take another swill from his beer, then set the bottle down carefully on the floor amidst his furry friends, who hopped around him in a twitching, scratching, nibbling, nose-wiggling, ear flicking mob of adoration. The big gray rabbit—Sam had determined it _was_ a female, and probably the matriarch of all the others—perched like a stone rabbit-shaped lion on his brother's chest. She refused to move.

"Centzon-Totochtin was the group of drunken rabbits; their name meant 'infinite rabbits' and they…oh." Sam sat back in his chair. This didn't help them explain how to fix the situation, but it somehow seemed to fit. "They represent the myriad ways people can be affected by their drunkenness."

Dean made his thinking face. Apparently, not much thought was occurring, however, because all he said was, "Yeah, I can see that." A little bunny hopped up onto him and burrowed under his shirt; Dean barely seemed to notice. "Anything else?"

"Well…" Sam copied and pasted the name into his search engine. "Apparently the rabbits liked to get together and party with the main god, Ometechitli. There were…oh." Sam frowned as the rabbit-god family tree popped up. It had a lot of branches. "Well, there were a lot of them." He clicked on the different hyperlinks. "Most of them were also gods of fertility. And drunkenness. Seems to be a pattern." He looked at all the bunnies hopping around Dean. "Remember the last time we were in this area?"

Dean made a face. "Not really. If you remember, I was pretty much not remembering anything because I was hexed by some witches. So I didn't even remember who I was…" He stroked the gray bunny on his chest and stared up at the ceiling. Then his eyes widened and he lifted his head to peer at her. "Oh. Shit."

Sam didn't like the sound of that. "What?"

"I woke up in the forest that morning…with…" He stared at the rabbit. " _Her_."

It took Sam several seconds to process that, mostly because his brain had skidded to a halt and held up a huge, "Hell, NO!" sign. But eventually, he had to realize what it meant. "You mean, you…slept…with a…rabbit?"

"Not just a rabbit. _This_ rabbit." Dean suddenly scrambled to his feet. Bunnies flew; the little one under his shirt poked its head out at his chest. "Gah!" He quickly—but gently—grabbed the little guy and dropped him to the floor. "Oh my God. Oh my God!" He wiggled as if he were having a convulsion. "Except, I don't think she was a rabbit at that point. Or maybe I wasn't a person. You know. Like…me." He shuddered again. "Oh, my God! I'm a rabbit-dad."

The gray bunny stood on her hind end and appeared to nod. Dean backed away. "But I wasn't drunk. I was hexed! I didn't know what I was doing. I didn't even know who I was! Or, what I was. Or…I mean…am. I mean—Sam! What do we do, now?"

* * *

"That will be $4578.50," the vet receptionist told Sam. "Wow. You guys really like rabbits."

Sam looked over at Dean, who was trying to figure out how to easily hold five, handled pet carriers filled with groggy bunnies. "Yeah. You have no idea." He handed her a fake credit card they'd gotten specifically for the purpose of neutering Dean's offspring. Which, Dean never failed to remind him, were his nieces and nephews.

"Most people would just put them up for adoption. They _are_ awfully cute," the receptionist chirped, running the card through the machine.

"Yeah." Sam nodded. "Adorable. We love them."

 _Dean_ loved them. Of course, he didn't have to clean their freaking cages as often as Sam did. His brother was great at holding and feeding the bunnies, and making sure they had water. And letting them out to exercise—and leave bunny scat-all over the bunker. But when it came to the nitty-gritty of it all, Sam was often the one left holding the bag. And the broom. So really, he merely tolerated them.

"Here you go!" She handed Sam a pen. "Now don't forget, you have a follow-up appointment in three weeks. We didn't put cone-collars on them because-" she giggled—"we actually didn't have enough of them to supply you. Plus, they wouldn't have all fit in the carriers. So you're going to have to watch them carefully and make sure they don't pull out their stitches or lick themselves."

 _Fat chance._ As soon as he'd dropped Dean off at the bunker, Sam was going on a vacation. He didn't know where, exactly, but it was someplace rabbit-free. He signed the receipt. "Okay," he told her. Knowing Dean, he'd probably assign the task of watching his offspring to Cas. The angel never slept anyway. And, he didn't appear to mind bunny sitting. Of course, he was happy to do anything Dean asked him to—whatever it was.

He turned and took two of the carriers from his brother. "Come on, let's go." Together, they made their way to Baby. Them, and the rabbits.

Just another day, in life of a Winchester.


End file.
